Old Europe (2)

You don’t need to queue at the entrance
but then so dark your captions now unreadable
since the children left.
Come dine with me in a dead café.
Let’s dance in my old Turkish residence
lined with uncut books
where a cigar accords with taste
and the chocolatier snores.
You may need to sidestep the urine.
Rémy flew home in a djellaba
the armless no glory veteran
the pigeons don’t bother with the bread
the accordion’s sellotaped to wheeze a tune.
The Romanies sell puppies to lovesick tourists
but the light is what we dream,
Saron’s scything searchlight,
the Eiffel Tower a blingy earring
on the ear of Europa.
In the courtyard of a hôtel particulier
she showed me the seventeenth century
rainwashed and dishabille
with a horse in harness
and a Russian lover who won’t spy for money or love.
A warning: the shih tzu twins are locked in
patrolling my millionaire terrace,
the road a crime scene below, a day-for-night
with Citroen and café shoot-out.
You might have to step over the body.
I only come here for a summer
for language, macaroons,
delicious cod. Good thing Cheryl
got the handbag she wanted she’s
so persistent we filmed it.

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Adam Aitken has published four main collections of poetry and other pamphlets. His latest is Eighth Habitation (Giramondo Publishing). He teaches at the University of Technology, Sydney.